Decorate palm trees :)

Actually palm trees are not very beautiful trees but widely used in landscaping. Only a truck and some leaves on the top.
But in the summer house gardens they work very good as they do not block your or neighbours view.
you can easily decorate the trunk by hanging wall planters or baskets on them.

Plant more beautiful than the flowers in the photo. :)

Red hibiscus flowers

To my opinion hibiscus is a very decorative flower for the gardens. Above photo was taken in our garden last summer. You can find manytype and colours of this flower like red, orange, yellow, white.
We have only white and red. May be an orange should be added.
:)

Vegetable Gardening : How to Grow Heirloom Tomatoes

Here's a video showing howto grow heirloom tomatoes.
Growing heirloom tomatoes is best done in the spring time, in a tomato cage.

I like to eat heirloom tomatoes see the photo of the one I ate last summer. Click the garden label.
:))

Pink heirloom tomatoes

I wanted to take the photographs of these delicious pink tomatoes. Actually these are not very big ones. I ate bigger ones :)

An heirloom tomato (also called heritage tomato in the UK) is an open-pollinated (non-hybrid) heirloom cultivar of tomato. Heirloom tomatoes have become increasingly popular and more readily available in recent years. (wikipedia)

Big, beautiful, pink and luscious with classic heirloom flavor. Completely natual.

These are found locally in some villages nowadays. May not be suitable for transportation. They're usually grown by small scale farmers.

Tree planter again :)

If you got a tree trunk in your garden as it is very difficult to remove the roots, you may use it like a planter for other flowers.

Make a hole in the trunk of the tree and plant some flowers.

To see other tree planters in this blog please click here.

Carob tree for your health

Another tree for decoration of your garden and also good for your health. But this need a climate like mediterranean countries.

The carob tree , Ceratonia siliqua, is a species of flowering evergreen shrub or tree in the pea family, Fabaceae, that is native to the Mediterranean region. It is cultivated for its edible seed pods. Carobs are also known as St. John's bread because, according to tradition of some Christians, St. John the Baptist subsisted on them in the wilderness. A similar legend exists of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and his son.

Carob, dried or roasted and having a slightly sweet taste, in powder or chip form, is used as an ingredient in cakes and cookies. Carob is sometimes used as a substitute for chocolate. The seeds, also known as locust beans, are used as animal feed. They are also the source of locust bean gum, a thickening agent used in numerous processed foods. In Egypt, carobs are consumed as a snack. Crushed pods are used to make a refreshing drink. Compotes and liqueurs are made from carob in Turkey, Malta, Portugal, Spain and Sicily. Carob has proven effective in relieving diarrhea in infants. In Libya, a syrup is extracted from carob named rub used as a complimentary to Asida meal. In Peru carob syrup is used in a popular mixed drink, la algarrobina.

Carob has also been used as a non-toxic alternative to chocolate in dog treats, as the theobromine in chocolate is toxic to most dogs.

• No cholestherol
• no cafein
• plenty of Ca, about 3 times higher than milk
• high zinc

It is said that it has alot more advantages for health. But please check all the information here (actually you should check all the information you get from internet before using it).

I liked the tree and the fruits of it also the food made of it. I took the photos of the fruits on the tree. It is a nice evergreen tree for landscaping. You can also collect the fruit of it.

But the fruit does not look nice like an apple. ... :)

Here is a nice big carob tree at the seaside

Lantana Camara flower

It is a nice flower for your garden.

It gives flowers every summer continuously and you do not have to work much for it.

:)

It grows to 1.8-2meters high. But ours not, we cut because of the view. :)

In the same plants you can see many flowers with different colours.

It should be good for butterflies and bees, because I saw a lot of bees and butterflies visiting these flowers

:)

A healthy and beautiful tree for your garden

If you have a garden and want a fruit tree Zizihus zizyphus is a good idea.

It is a beautiful small tree (about 4-5 meters high but in some regions it is higher) and has delicious and healthy fruits.

Ziziphus zizyphus, commonly called Jujube, Red Date, or Chinese Date, is a species of Ziziphus in the buckthorn family Rhamnaceae, used primarily for its fruits.

I took the the photos here during my summer holiday in mediterranean cost.

It is very good in that climate.

The fruits are used in Chinese and Korean traditional medicine, where they are believed to alleviate stress.

The freshly harvested as well as the candied dried fruits are often eaten as a snack, or with tea.

The fruit is an edible oval drupe 1.5-3 cm long; when immature it is smooth-green, with the consistency and taste of an apple, maturing dark red to purplish-black and eventually wrinkled.

On the photos the green and brown stages of the fruit can be seen.

I ate the ones on the last photograph they were delicious

:))

Upside down tomatos :)

I saw a ready made upside down planter for vegetables in a website.

I found interesting.

If you do not have a garden with this system you may have your garden in your balcony of your apartment :)

Growing tomatoes upside-down eliminates the need for weeding, staking or tying your plants and it's ideal for gardeners with limited space or limited mobility.

When you’re ready to plant, simply fill the liner with our Organic Self-Watering Container Mix, add our All-Organic Tomato Fertilizer (both sold separately) and insert a tomato seedling through the bottom opening. Hang the planter in a convenient, sunny spot and before you know it, you’ll be harvesting your own sweet, juicy organic tomatoes.

For more details:

http://www.gardeners.com/Gardeners-Revolution-Planter/VegetableGardening_SpaceIntensive,37-850,default,cp.html

2nd phase of plums

This is the second phase of the plums in our garden. I have sent the flowers in my previous post.

I think third photo will be when I am eating them :)

Rose hips

The end of roses.

In the winter season the photo of roses.

Actually they are rosehips.

Some type of these are dried and you can drink like tea. You can find a lot of information in the internet saying that they are very healthy. But which type of rose hips?

For better rose pictures see http://www.hephotos.blogspot.com

Black mulberry tree planter

This is a black mulberry tree. The main part of the tree was dead but the branch is still alive and we ate a lot of delicious mulberries last summer.

Inside the dead trunk they decided to plant a planter. Now it works like a planter.

As it is winter now it is not very beautiful. I hope I will take a photograph in summer and post here again.

Datura stramonium

I saw this beautiful flower in our garden. Actually nobody planted it. Seeds should have come from somewhere.

First did not know what flower is that. But I searched the net and found that it is Datura stramonium.

According to wikipedia it is also known as jimson weed, ditch weed, stink weed, loco weed, Korean morning glory, Jamestown weed, thorn apple, angel's trumpet, devil's trumpet, devil's snare, devil's seed, mad hatter, crazy tea, malpitte, and, along with Datura metel, zombie cucumber is a common weed in the Nightshade Family.

All parts of Datura plants contain dangerous levels of poison and may be fatal if ingested by humans or animals, including livestock and pets. So, may not be good for your garden.

So, it is a dangerous plant but it can be used as a medical plant also. There was a time when stramonium, a drug obtained from the leaves and seeds of Datura stramonium, was used medicinally (Herbalgram). Because of the dangers of tropane poisoning, datura is not used medicinally today, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has claimed it to be unfit for human consumption

For more information check : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datura_stramonium

a tree planter

If you have an old tree in your garden or around. You can easily cut it but it is difficult to remove

the roots and log completely.

You can remove some parts inside and use it as a natural planter.

It is decorative and natural.

Plant some flower inside. I took this picture when there was no flowers inside yet. With the flowers it will become more beautiful.